By 2020, at least seven new gigawatt-size battery factories are scheduled to start operating in Europe, writes Zak Derler of Climate Home News. European companies, such as car manufacturer Daimler, invest in their own regionally-based gigafactories to meet the battery demand for electric vehicles in the continent and the world.
The Bay Area—that is, San Francisco and Silicon Valley—currently accounts for nearly 45 percent of total venture capital investment in the entire United States. And the Acela Corridor, spanning Boston, New York, and Washington, comprises another third. Together, these two geographic regions attract nearly three-quarters of America’s venture capital investment. And, just the five leading […]
Demand for low-skilled worker visas for the summer season starting Sunday is again far outstripping supply, with the Trump administration forced to choose between helping businesses seeking more visas or trying to save those jobs for American workers. Some lawmakers tried and failed this month to secure an increase in the number of H-2B visas […]
Manufacturing, and especially the initial production of new technologies, must be seen as part of the innovation system. It is an autonomously creative stage in which a new product must evolve through prototyping, product definition, and production design from an idea into both a marketable and produce-able good. This often requires a re-examination of the […]
The state averages one economic boom and one bust per decade and California’s recovery from the Great Recession now has lasted well beyond historic expectations. In other words, as Gov. Jerry Brown, the Capitol’s resident economic worrywart, often points out, California is overdue for a downturn. That’s why he wants to squirrel away as much […]
California’s continuation high schools are meant to give students a last chance to get back on track for graduation, but state data reveal that many of the schools struggle with a basic challenge: Getting students to attend each day. Nearly 60 percent of continuation high school students were considered chronically absent during the 2016-17 school […]
But even among the nation’s largest metropolitan areas, the Los Angeles-Orange County region’s growth rate last year dropped precipitously — .19 percent — less than one third the average for the country’s 53 largest metro areas. By itself, Los Angeles’ rate was even lower, an insignificant .13 percent. Overall, L.A.-Orange County ranked lower than all […]
It is a problem playing out in many parts of the Midwest, a region with lower unemployment and higher job-opening rates than the rest of the country. Employers, especially in more rural areas, are finding that there are just too few workers. That upends a long-running view in Washington, D.C., and many state capitals, where […]
U.S. factories reported robust demand for their products in March but say rising prices for materials, tied to new tariffs, threaten to slow the industry’s expansion. The Institute for Supply Management said Monday its index of factory activity settled at 59.3 in March, down slightly from 60.8 the prior month. Any reading above 50 indicates […]
The California Chamber of Commerce yesterday released its annual list of job killer bills and launched its new Capitol Insider Blog, which, in this first installment, provides details about the list and the 21 bills that have been identified as those that pose the greatest threat to California’s job climate and economy. Sign up to […]
Hiring slowed in March from February’s robust pace and the unemployment rate held at a 17-year low, consistent with a tight but not overheating labor market producing modest wage gains. U.S. nonfarm payrolls rose a seasonally adjusted 103,000 in March—the smallest gain in six months, the Labor Department said Friday. It was a pullback from […]
This leads to our second challenge, how to grow opportunity for the region’s working and middle-class residents. Despite its reputation as an abode for the rich, or at least the very affluent, barely one in three OC residents earns over $75,000, a significantly lower level than many of our competitors. Much of our job growth […]
Some of Trump’s actions, notably the proposed tariffs, may be crude and even wrong-headed but other moves, notably focus on China’s buying of American technology assets, expose the fundamental weakness of the neoliberal trade regime. Trump’s policy agenda would never have risen if neoliberalism was able to improve the lives of the vast majority of […]
Every bit of data tells us that California faces a potential crisis because it is failing to generate enough college-educated workers to replace retiring baby boomers and fill the demands of an increasingly sophisticated economy. That failure underscores the irrelevance of the state’s nearly 60-year-old “master plan” for higher education, which envisioned seamless, low-cost access […]
Overcrowded campuses and increased international popularity is forcing the University of California and California State University schools to turn away thousands of eligible local students, an exodus that could lead to a brain drain in the state later. The worry that tens of thousands of bright, talented Californians could be leaving the state for good […]